Immunity Deals Offered to Blackwater Guards
State Department investigators offered Blackwater employees immunity during their investigation into the shooting of 17 Iraqis in Baghdad.
The State Department may claim that they had no knowledge of this offer and even hint that they disapprove of such a thing, but one has to wonder whether any Blackwater employee who made a statement - believing himself to have immunity - could now be prosecuted for a statement he made under such circumstances.The State Department investigators from the agency’s investigative arm, the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, offered the immunity grants even though they did not have the authority to do so, the officials said. Prosecutors at the Justice Department, who do have such authority, had no advance knowledge of the arrangement, they added.
Most of the guards who took part in the Sept. 16 shooting were offered what officials described as limited-use immunity, which means that they were promised that they would not be prosecuted for anything they said in their interviews with the authorities as long as their statements were true. The immunity offers were first reported Monday by The Associated Press.
The officials who spoke of the immunity deals have been briefed on the matter, but agreed to talk about the arrangement only on the condition of anonymity because they had not been authorized to discuss a continuing criminal investigation.
The precise legal status of the immunity offer is unclear. Those who have been offered immunity would seem likely to assert that their statements are legally protected, even as some government officials say that immunity was never officially sanctioned by the Justice Department.
Spokesmen for the State and Justice Departments would not comment on the matter. A State Department official said, “If there’s any truth to this story, then the decision was made without consultation with senior officials in Washington.”
It was hard enough already to know how to prosecute Blackwater employees:
Blackwater employees and other civilian contractors cannot be tried in military courts, and it is unclear what American criminal laws might cover criminal acts committed in a war zone. Americans are immune from Iraqi law under a directive signed by the United States occupation authority in 2003 that has not been repealed by the Iraqi Parliament.This offer of immunity, whether sanctioned by the State Department or not, has just made prosecution even more unlikely.
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2 comments:
This offer of immunity, whether sanctioned by the State Department or not, has just made prosecution even more unlikely.
Of course you mean "prosecution in the event a crime has been committed", right? Heaven forbid we wait until the results of the FBI investigation are in before rushing towards a conviction.
Of course you mean "prosecution in the event a crime has been committed", right?
Of course. But all current indications are that a crime has possibly been committed which is why offers of immunity before the facts have been established is so disgraceful.
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